


With the Truth in My Veins, I Know I Want You

by LSPrincess



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Cheating, Drugs, Dry Humping, Ed and Oswald are drugged up dumbasses, Floor Sex, Fluff, Fluff and Smut, Frottage, Hand Jobs, Idiots in Love, Jim's still a cop, Kidnapping, Laughter, Love Confessions, M/M, Morning After, Mutual Masturbation, Not Canon Compliant, Post-Episode: s03e07 Red Queen, Sexual Tension, because I'm ignoring his emo p.i. phase
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-16
Updated: 2019-09-16
Packaged: 2020-11-02 07:01:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20661128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LSPrincess/pseuds/LSPrincess
Summary: The night after the Founder's Dinner, Oswald doesn't come home. After receiving a letter sent by the infamous Jervis Tetch, Ed ventures out to retrieve the missing mayor. When they escape, neither are as clear-headed as when they entered.-“God, you two are high as kites right now,” Harvey sighed, pulling Ed back up into a semi-standing position as they stumbled their way out the door into the damn near blinding sunlight.“We are not!” Oswald shouted in protest, jerking his head up and nearly breaking Jim’s nose. “We are hiiighly respected government officials who just happened to have gotten drugged. Against our will!”





	With the Truth in My Veins, I Know I Want You

**Author's Note:**

> This is disjointed and makes very little sense. Also there's a vine reference in here :)))

It had occurred to Ed that night.

He’d told Isabella who he was, what he had done, the atrocities he’d committed, and she’d still wanted him. Still loved him. So he’d kissed her, so long that his jaw ached, so long that the sky outside had darkened and the house had fallen silent. In that realization, she’d asked to stay (or that Edward come over), and it had dawned on him: Oswald wasn’t home. He’d left for the Founder’s Dinner _ eight hours _ prior, and now, with the moonlight shining in through the windows in the living room, he still hadn’t returned. That epiphany had shaken Ed to his core.

In response, he’d suggested that Isabella leave (the mood had been ruined anyway by Ed’s amounting dread), for he’d likely be waiting up for Oswald to return. She’d been more than noticeably crestfallen by the sudden change of events and had stressed that Oswald seemed a very capable man — he could take care of himself. That remark had only worsened Ed’s mood, and his gentle requests for her departure rode a wave of ire to new heights, and he soon found himself insisting that she leave and all but shoving her out the door.

A cursory glance at the clock told him that it was midnight, and with that fact came the understanding that there was very little that should hold Oswald this long. He was a hardworking man with physical limitations and a testy extent to his tolerance for social gatherings — he would be tired no doubt, and depending on the level of entertainment present, might have even found an excuse to leave early. Following that logic, Ed should have been expecting him two or three hours earlier, but obviously, he had not appeared.

So, Ed made himself a cup of tea, settled down by the fire with a stack of books he’d already read, and waited, flicking through the pages of the first book and smiling at the memories the words brought. And waited, pouring himself another cup of tea and anxiously checking the clock. And waited, hardly registering the words of the final book of his prepared stack as he shook with dread. And waited, having finished the whole pot of tea and chewing his nails until they were bloody, staring at the door with strained wide eyes.

But Oswald didn’t come.

So Edward didn’t rest.

He’d paced around the house for an hour, searching every nook and cranny in the fanciful hopes that a human being might be able to hide themselves on a closet shelf or under a chair like a cat, but unfortunately (and most certainly not surprisingly), such a thing was untrue. It was only after fifteen missed calls and twenty-two unread messages that Olga had come in with an envelope, stating that it had been left on the doorstep. Ed had practically smashed his phone in his haste to put it down in favor of ripping the envelope open.

Inside of it, there was a note.

And after reading it, Ed called the police.

_ “Nygma, _ slow down. _ You never make any sense on a _ normal _ day, but right now you’re—” _

“Where is Jim?” Ed cried into the phone. “Is he there? Is he _ listening?” _

When all Ed received in response was a sigh, the thought of killing Harvey was almost mouth-watering. Unfortunately, however, the scheme Ed was forming was pushed to the back of his mind when another voice rang out over the phone.

_ “I’m here, Ed,” _ Jim began in a slow, calculated voice he likely thought was calming. “And _ I’m listening. And I must admit, from your standpoint, it sounds pretty stressful. But you have to remember, this is _ Oswald _ we’re talking about. Is it really _ that _ shocking for him not to come home for a few hours?” _

“No, you’re _ not _ listening, Jim,” Ed growled, teeth clenched so hard he was sure there would be damage. “There was _ no one _ he knew personally at that dinner, and without intimate company, he cannot _ stand _ social gatherings like that for too long. It’s been _ eighteen hours _ since he left, Jim. Did you not even _ hear _ the part about the note?”

_ “You mean the part where Jervis Tetch wrote you a note saying that he had Oswald and you’d only get him back if we came too? Yes, I heard it, Ed. And it sounds like he’s trying to rile you up. It may be a distraction. We can’t be sure—” _

“I forget that you’re all too fucking lazy to do a damn thing to help your citizens,” Ed spat with as much venom as he could without completely exploding.

_ “Whoa, language!” _Harvey’s distant voice came from the other end, but Jim continued before Ed could carry on with his uncharacteristically profane tirade.

_ “Ed, I understand your concern, but—” _

“It was in the _ news _ that Tetch crashed the Founder’s Dinner last night. Now, Oswald doesn’t come home, and I get a letter from that same freak saying that he kidnapped him, and you _ don’t believe it? _ That entire precinct is naive, irrational, and _ irresponsible! _ You detectives are so lax it’s a _ miracle _ there are any criminals to put away! Tetch left an address, and I’m going there to get Oswald. You’d better show up. And if you don’t and we both die, I’ve told Olga to tell the press it’s the GCPD’s fault.”

_ “Ed—” _ Jim began, sounding a hair sterner and more shaken, but Ed slammed the phone onto its pedestal before the detective’s protests could reach his burning ears.

The address left on the note was one Ed knew only from his intimate familiarity with the city. It was a very private and widely unknown venue — an expansive warehouse used solely for storing old amusement park attractions if Ed was remembering correctly. It had been previously owned, managed, and protected by a middle-aged man who was definitively presumed dead after it came to light that it was now operating as a psychotic magician’s elected hideout. The change in management was decidedly not as surprising as it should have been, Ed mused.

Luckily, the destination was only half an hour from the Van Dahl Manor (cut to approximately nineteen minutes, courtesy of Ed’s reckless speed). It still would have been closer to the GCPD, though, and that thought left a bitter taste in Ed’s mouth, even as he swung into the vaguely marked parking lot of the warehouse.

Staring up at the sun-bleached facade, Ed noted it was less dilapidated than he had anticipated, though that still did not save it from being greeted with fiery scorn as he bounded in through the ajar side door.

The inside was certainly more like what was expected: dark, dank, musty, and nothing short of downright _ disturbing. _ Some of the attractions that Ed wove through were broken, bits of carefully constructed faces chipped away and once-vibrant paint scratched, stained, and peeling. In some distant corners, there was a multicolored glow, likely from some showy light attraction that was too tenacious to accept its desuetude and finally flicker out. The air was chilled and thick with dust, the stench of forensic cleaners’ chemicals faint enough to not be noticed by someone with an untrained nose. Distantly, Ed supposed there were worse places to designate one’s lair, but there were certainly some more secluded and with superior all-around aesthetics. To each their own, of course, but were Ed to pick a lair, he’d prefer one without a gore-covered high striker.

The end of his scrutiny was marked by the realization that there was a second floor, to which he spared no hesitation and raced toward recklessly, careless of the antique carnival entertainments now that he had a promising destination. And fruitful it was found to be, for once he’d scaled the rotting stairs two at a time, he spotted a slumped figure on the other end of a banquet table.

“Oswald?” Ed hissed into the waiting silence. There was no distinctly intelligible answer, but the figure did stir. “Oswald, is that you?” he called again, louder this time, and was answered with a stifled grunt.

Without preamble, he stalked forward, throwing chairs out of his way and shoving the table away from the slumped Oswald with a bout of heroic strength, kneeling down in the vacated space and patting Oswald’s cheeks.

“Oswald. Oswald! Can you hear me? Can you look at me?” he said, hooking Oswald’s chin with three fingers and tilting his head up. His blue-green eyes were surprisingly open but foggy and unattentive. When Ed opened his mouth to speak again, he was interrupted by laughter — mildly manic and severely unsettling laughter, especially coming from the dazed man he’d just found tied to a chair.

“Oswald?” Ed asked softly, retracting his hand fearfully and scrubbing his sweaty palms against his pant legs. “Are you okay?”

“You’re here!” the mayor crowed, his head thrown back against the high-backed chair, eyes rolling in their sockets and blinking languidly. “You’re here, you _ idiot! _ You actually came! _ By yourself!” _ he panted, tears of mirth streaming down his cheeks.

“Of course I came, Oswald. When you didn’t come home, I—”

“Have you learned _ nothing, _ you goddamn _ moron?” _ he gasped through peals of hysterical laughter, leaning forward as far as his restraints would let him, his glassy eyes trained on Ed’s face.

The words hurt more than Ed would ever let on, the humorous tone they were spoken in merely adding salt to the wound. It wasn’t natural, he knew — Oswald would never talk to him like that! — but if there was no new agony to be found, the words merely reopened old scars.

“Oswald, w-what’s happening? What did he do to you?” Ed asked, trying to redirect the conversation to a more conducive endpoint.

Oswald’s laughter decreased to a series of breathless giggles, slouching back in his seat and rolling his eyes fondly at Ed’s question. “Gave me…some kind of drug, I think. Something to make me talk, probably?”

“Talk?” Ed asked, ignoring the fresh wave of dread that washed over him at the word “drug.” “Talk about what?”

“He wanted to get some intel on Gordon.”

“And you fought him on that?”

“Of _ course _ not!” Oswald physically spat, lunging forward then flinging himself back, setting the chair into a precarious rock that Ed had to settle. “The drug was a pr… _ precau—” _

“A precaution?” Ed offered, gripping Oswald’s forearms to keep him in a vaguely stationary position.

_ “That,” _ Oswald confirmed with an appreciative nod. “He gave it to me before. Had me tied up here for _ ever.” _

“How long ago was that?”

“Forever’s a long time, Ed—”

“No, Oswald,” Ed groaned, pinching his eyes shut and focusing on controlling his irritation. “How long ago did he give you the drug? Do you remember?”

_ “Pfft,” _ Oswald scoffed, spraying more spittle into the air. “I…dunno. Hard to tell, really — Did you know that everything just kind of _ blends together _ when you’re on this shit? Like, not even thoughts, but _ objects _ too! It’s really surreal and pretty—”

“Oswald, I need you to focus,” Ed growled, giving the chair a firm shake. “When did he give you the drug? Do you have an approximation?”

“A what?” Oswald slurred, blinking down at Ed.

“A _ guess,” _ Ed simplified, rolling his eyes exasperatedly.

“Oh, well…An hour, maybe?” he mumbled, wiggling his bound hands against the arms of the chair, head lolling to the side in exaggerated thought. “That sounds about right. Wouldn’t you say, Jervis?”

“Closer to two, my little cockatoo,” a melodic voice rang out, and before Ed could swing around to defend himself, a hand was covering his mouth and an alarmingly long (and likely unsterile) needle was sinking into his neck.

“My, what fun for the lapdog to jump the gun, but I cannot risk distractions, for Jim Gordon must be called to action,” Tetch continued, lowering Ed to the floor and looming over him with a frightening smile darkening his face. “I must express my disappointment in you for coming alone when I said three were due. But a genius in my arsenal is something worth rejoicing, for there are aspects of Gordon’s life our mayor resisted in voicing. An ex-coworker of the Detective is an advantage most sublime! Let’s see how many truths we can get out of _ you _ this time.”

“So what _ exactly _ did you give him on me?” Gordon asked, lunging forward to catch Oswald before he could trip and fall onto his face.

It hadn’t taken thirty minutes after Jervis’ surprise attack for the day’s most anticipated officers to make their grand appearance. Edward hadn’t been really paying attention to the scene they inevitably caused, too fascinated by the weight he felt in his fingers as he wiggled them up and down, but the bits that he did catch were nothing short of hilarious: Mainly shouted rhymes, ricocheted bullets, and sworn vengeance. Who even says “You’ll rue the day” anymore?

“Nothing _ crude, _ Jim,” Oswald groaned, stumbling for balance and eventually just leaning heavily against Gordon as he dragged him in the direction of the exit.

“Yeah, have a little _ faith _ in us,” Ed contributed, breaking into gut-busting laughter at the way his tongue felt in his mouth and how it seemed to move with its own volition.

“God, you two are high as kites right now,” Harvey sighed, pulling Ed back up into a semi-standing position as they stumbled their way out the door into the damn near blinding sunlight.

“We are _ not!” _ Oswald shouted in protest, jerking his head up and nearly breaking Jim’s nose. “We are _ hiiighly _ respected government officials who just _ happened _ to have gotten drugged. Against our _ will!” _

“Yeah! You can’t hold it against us when it was non-consensual drug use!” Ed agreed, sagging back against the firm figure of Harvey behind him as he pushed him into the parking lot.

“I can hold _ anything _ against you when you keep pushin’ back on me like that,” Harvey retorted, manhandling Ed into the back seat of the police car and Jim doing the same with Oswald, resulting in Ed in a slouched sitting position and Oswald horizontal with his head in Ed's lap.

“I am too old to wrestle beanpoles into cars,” Bullock groaned, stretching his back and rolling his shoulders.

“You seem to have no problem wrestling women into your bed,” Oswald mumbled from where his cheek was pressed against Ed’s thigh.

“Oswald! That’s _ rude!” _ Ed chided, trying to fight back the chortle building in his throat.

“As entertaining as this is,” Jim interrupted, looking back at them from his post in the driver’s seat, “I need to know what you two told Tetch.”

“Oh, _ God, _ you’re boring,” Oswald groaned. “But, if it will _ appease _you…Oh, let’s see…I told him about you saving my life.”

“Oh, when he pushed you in the river?” Ed asked, looking down at Oswald with sparkling eyes.

“Yeah, exactly—!” Oswald began, fingers drumming wildly against the stiff cushions of the seat, seeming so excited at the prospect of recounting the event to equally eager ears. The look on his face was more than encouraging, and Ed was prepared to settle in and listen to him ramble about that day as fervently and animatedly as his heart desired — a plan which was cut disgracefully short by their temporary chauffeur.

_ “And?” _ Jim pressed, snapping his fingers for their attention, an action that startled Ed more than he cared to admit. Every boss he’d had at the precinct had done it to him at least once to regain his attention — some of his more self-assured coworkers even dared to do it — but Jim never had. The novelty of the experience made it all the more jarring, but from the bright, happy memory that was shoving its way through the murky vestiges of past trespasses and cruelties, it seemed not jarring enough.

“I told him about you being nice to me at the precinct!” Ed added with bubbly excitement, the images in his mind a truly heartwarming change of pace. “And the time I hugged you!”

“You hugged Jim?” Oswald gasped, hand fisting in the fabric covering Ed’s knee, foggy blue eyes blinking up at him owlishly.

“Of course!” Ed confirmed with a curt nod, finding himself somehow even giddier at the prospect of sharing a similar experience with Oswald. When reassessing the tone with which Oswald’s question was delivered, however, his brow furrowed with incredulity. “Don’t tell me you’ve never—?”

“Guys!” Jim called, pounding the back of his seat in a crude and auditorily offensive attempt to draw them back to the topic at hand.

_ “Excuse _ me,” Ed snapped, raising a finger to silence the detective and his unnecessary aggressions against the upholstery. “We are having a very _ deep _ and _ personal _ discussion!”

“No, I never _ hugged _ him,” the smaller man continued, jabbing his nose pointedly in Jim’s direction with a childish pout gracing his lips. “He wouldn’t even visit my club when I asked.”

At Oswald’s words, the memory of that day hit Ed full force, throwing at him the exact sounds and visuals and preceding events — in which his first interaction with Oswald had occurred. The older man had appeared very determined to fulfill whatever quest he was on, but there was not an _ ounce _ of thoughtful conflict in Ed’s heart as he’d approached him, for when would he find another opportunity as prime as that one to introduce himself to a real gangster, a man too pretty and petite to be running with the lowlife muck of the city but too cruel and volatile to listen to such an assessment? It felt like a once in a lifetime experience on the rare occasion that Gordon and Oswald’s paths would not cross as seamlessly as they typically did, and Ed could insinuate himself directly in the middle of that preconceived intersection to catch the infamous Penguin by surprise — it was his only chance at winning a conversation with him.

In the end, he’d been dismissed, which of course hadn’t been unpredicted but had happened far sooner than Ed would have preferred. Another conversation gone awry (most likely because it was loosely a conversation and more him spitting quirky comments at an entirely uninterested man), another person overlooking him, and he’d filed himself away in a corner on the second floor to continue observing that elusive arctic creature who turned out to be far colder than anticipated. Eventually, Jim finally did make an appearance, only to deny Oswald’s invitation and leave the uprising King of Gotham visibly dejected. In Ed’s mind, it had been a transgression punishable by death — if, of course, the title of city King held more literal value.

“That is _ low, _ Jim,” Ed ultimately condescended, shaking his cloudy head exaggeratedly. It was a simple conclusion to the raging thoughts in his heavy, cumbersome skull, but the only words he seemed to have on the matter at the moment. “I would have come to your club,” he added, turning to Oswald with as sincere of a grin as his faintly numb face could muster.

Oswald chuckled and lifted a cold hand to cup Ed’s face, lips drawn up in a darling smile, cherry-red cheeks stretched taught and plump around his glowing eyes. “Thank you, Ed.”

There was something in that expression that was jarringly misplaced, Ed regarded — something in those damned eyes, something hot and bright and promising like a distant fire, the warm glow of flames igniting something low in Ed’s stomach. Accompanying it was a tightness in his jaw, like he should move it toward something, _ against _ something. Unfortunately (or was it thankfully? Ed really couldn’t quite tell), the detective continued before he could give those foreign sensations too much thought.

“Fine,” Gordon huffed, spinning in his seat and starting the car. “Forget it. We’ll head on.”

“Thank you! For _ once _ you have a good idea!” Harvey exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air like he was addressing some inconceivably distant deity. “These idiots are gonna give me a migraine before we get out of the city.”

“Hey!” Ed protested, accenting the “h.” “I’ll have you know that these idiots—”

There had certainly been more to follow that defensive outburst, something in relation to their respective places and reputations in the city government, but those words were lost in the depths of his mind as the car whipped around, nearly ejecting him out the windshield and making him clutch Oswald to his stomach, wide-eyed and shaking with mortal terror.

_ “Christ!” _ he gasped, feeling along the ceiling for a safety handle that wasn’t there. “You pull out so fast!”

Though the fear in his stomach felt as tangible as a block of lead and the rate his heart was beating at was most likely a medical concern, the apparently completely unperturbed man draped across his legs felt the need to mindlessly break the ice, his eyes rolling behind closed lids and a silly smile stretching across his face as he drawled _ “Yaaaas” _ in a slow, groggy voice. Mere moments after, however, his eyes shot open and he clamped a hand over his mouth, the mutual realization of what he’d said hitting them both simultaneously and pitching them into a wheezing laughing fit.

“What was _ that?” _ Ed guffawed, pushing his glasses up his face to press his fingers against his teary eyes.

“I don’t know!” Oswald cried, kicking his legs like a child throwing a tantrum. “I wasn’t thinking!”

“Obviously not,” Bullock sighed, turning around and shoving Oswald (a little too roughly for Ed’s taste) against the back of the seat so he didn’t roll into the floor. “You two just take a nap, okay?” he said slowly with a strained smile. “It’ll make our lives easier. You need to sleep that shit off, anyway.”

“Not very likely,” Ed replied flatly, leaning his head back and absentmindedly carding his fingers through Oswald’s feathery hair. “It was part of Tetch’s ‘there’s no hope for you’ speech…thingy — this drug should last four hours at the very least. That leaves three and a half for me and about two for Oswald. So unless you fine gentlemen are thinking about going out on the town for a few hours, taking a nap on the way back won’t help our situation.”

“Maybe not, but it’ll make you a shade more tolerable,” Bullock said with a wicked grin, turning back to the front and punching the power button on the radio with far more force than was necessary, Ed noted with a wince.

The song that came warbling through the speakers was surprisingly tasteful for being a choice of Bullock. Ed would have expected something vulgar or even slightly off-beat, not the top-of-the-charts Boston song that was only half-intelligible through the ever-worsening static.

Though music had always been a passion of Ed’s, he abruptly realized that he hardly ever spent time catching up with the modern hits — of course he was aware of what was popular from his magazine subscriptions and the tunes he’d encounter on the rare occasions that he’d enter a store, but he never took the time to familiarize himself with them, learn the beat and the lyrics and critique the artist’s voice. Now presented with the opportunity, he distantly supposed he should try, but with Oswald’s warmth against his side and the weight of his head on his leg, he found it harder than normal to focus on anything else.

A very small and mostly unintelligible part of Ed’s conscience seemed very keen on scolding him for continuing to pet Oswald’s hair, but the dopey expression on the man’s face as he looked up at Ed all but smothered that voice to death.

“Do you remember,” Ed began, breaking off to fight a giggle, “when we were at the school? And there was that kid that almost threw up on you?”

At the prompted recollection, Oswald’s face seemed to want to harden with disgust, a repulsed frown that was really too familiar of an expression for its own good. At the first attempt to bare his teeth and glare at some unseen imagery, however, his lips quivered and he broke out into a deafening laugh, one that made Jim swerve and Ed flinch minutely.

“You looked like you were gonna _ kill him!” _ Ed cried despite the volume of Oswald’s amusement, too caught up in the way his abdomen cramped from the laughter to care about his sensory limitations.

“You’d think a _ fourth-grader _ would be able to _ not _ projectile vomit at my feet!” Oswald said, throwing his hands towards the ceiling and letting them flop back onto his chest like dead fish.

“Oh, come on! You can’t exactly _ control _ it,” Ed countered, pulling his glasses off to wipe his tears away. “Oh my _ God _— you should’ve seen your face!”

“You gagged!”

“Well, at least I didn’t reach for the _ knife _ in my shoe!”

“Hold on, hold on,” they were interrupted once more, Harvey turning around to speak to them both directly. “You mean to tell me that a _ kid _ almost threw up on your expensive Italian shoes and you _ didn’t _kill them?”

Oswald physically recoiled at the accusation, tucking his head against Ed’s hipbone and placing an offended hand to his heart.

“Of _ course _ I didn’t kill them, Harvey! I’m not a _ monster!” _

“Why didn’t we hear about this?” Jim queried, eyeing them both in the rearview mirror.

“Well, it didn’t exactly make _ national news, _ Jim.”

“I think it should have,” Ed said, an almost painful smile brightening his face. “That was definitely one of the best moments of that day. You have no idea how I felt, how…how _ anxious _ I was! I thought you were truly going to stab that kid in front of all his classmates and teachers. In times like that, I’ve never been more attrac—”

Careless. Thoughtless. Reckless. An admission he hadn’t even truly made to himself, let alone to other people. It was a slip of the tongue, the fault of his dulled senses and muted logic.

He hadn’t yet called himself _ lucky _ to have the reflection inside of him dictating his behavior, but at that moment he might have ruined _ everything _ if the Other hadn’t caught his tongue. That was about as lucky as he could get.

“What was that, Nygma?” Harvey asked, leaning forward with an expression that was far too knowing for Ed’s liking. “You’ve never been more _ what?” _

“I…Wh…What’s the word?” he stuttered, scratching his head in mock consideration. “I suppose ‘attracted’ works — I’ve never been more _ attracted _ to the idea of murder.”

It was a simple cover-up, one he had the smarter, crueller, more sober part of his conscience to thank for, but it seemed to do the trick. Bullock’s expression fell with blatant disappointment, but Oswald (whose opinion was far more important than any lazy, dirty cop’s) seemed entirely unfazed by the slip.

“That really isn’t something you should be admitting to police officers, Ed,” Jim mumbled, flicking on the turn signal and beginning the arduous process of getting across one of the three bridges connecting Gotham to the mainland. Thankfully, the traffic seemed to be moving at a fairly agreeable pace, and the Van Dahl mansion wasn’t even five miles inland from the coast.

“Oh, _ please,” _ Ed said with an unimpressed scoff. “Are you gonna arrest me for enjoying a crime that _ didn’t _ happen, Detective?”

“Don’t you _ dare,” _ Oswald growled, roused from whatever stupor he’d slipped into. “If you come anywhere _ near _ him I’ll strangle you, Jim Gordon.”

“Well, _ technically _ I can now arrest you for threatening a cop.”

“Well, that’s a different story entirely,” Oswald said with a peaceful hum, nuzzling his face against Ed’s thigh. “You’d be arresting _ me, _ not Ed. I can’t let someone take him away from me again.”

“And you think I want someone to take _ you _ away from _ me?” _ Ed asked, the depth of Oswald’s sentiment lost on his foggy mind. “The last time that happened they stripped you of your identity. That can’t happen again.”

“Please,” Oswald said with a full-body shudder and something that sounded like a choked-back laugh, “don’t remind me.”

“Well, the good news is, you shouldn’t be at risk of that again,” Jim chimed in, ever-helpful with his lawful morals and self-assured certainty that was blown out of proportion. “Hugo Strange has gone into hiding — no one knows where he is. He can’t brainwash you if he can’t find you.”

“Pfft, he’ll find a way,” Oswald said with a dismissive eye roll, stroking the pads of his fingers over the smooth fabric of Ed’s pants and occasionally picking away bits of fuzz Ed was sure weren’t there but was too pleased by the sensation to care.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Oh, he’s a _ stubborn _ little man, Jim,” Oswald grumbled, scooting closer to the edge of the seat so his fingers could explore the patterns on Ed’s sock and the smooth leather of his shoes. “Some small little… _ exile _ isn’t going to keep him away from his _ Frankenstein monsters _ or whatever,” he intoned with an animated jazz-hands motion. “It’s _ Gotham _— no one can stay away for long.”

“Right. Gotham,” Jim said monotonically, meditating on the words. “The city of gangsters as mayors, cop killers as their chief of staff, and demented magicians the only main threat to them both. What a city to love.”

“You’re certainly one to _ talk, _ Jim,” Oswald spat, shuffling back until his head met Ed’s torso again. “This city is as much your home as it is anyone else’s. You love her, don’t deny it.”

“I’m not denying anything,” Jim corrected with a small smile. “We all have to be at least half as crazy as the city herself to be so determined to stay.”

“Um,” Ed interjected, raising his hand to signify that he had a question, “if I don’t want to stay here, does that mean I’m saner than all of you?”

“In your little psychotic dreams, Nygma,” Harvey cooed sardonically. “And I may love this city as much as the next guy, but the mainland sure does have its perks. And you’ve got a nice house, Cobblepot,” he observed, the irregular rocking of the car over the gravel drive signifying their arrival more than their surroundings could (especially to Oswald, who still hadn’t looked out the window since the moment they entered the car).

“Thank you!” he gasped, beaming at the slightest hint of flattery. “It was my father’s. Dunno who built it. Dunno when built it—when it—when it was built,” he stuttered, and at Ed’s sudden burst of laughter, smacked him halfheartedly on the kneecap. “It’s a _ gorgeous _ place though. You boys wanna come in?”

The pronounced, simultaneous, instantaneous “no” he received in response should have been insulting, Ed thought, and would have been had they both not been wheezing from the harmonious unison of the detectives’ negation.

“Fine!” Oswald harrumphed, chest still heaving with pitifully subdued laughter. “Suit yourselves! I have all the company I need right here, anyway.”

“And that,” Harvey barked, halting Oswald in the process of reaching his hand up to caress Ed’s chest, “is exactly why we’re _ not _ coming in. You two have fun. Don’t break anything.”

“Well, my heart has already been broken by your senseless refusal, so perhaps _ mercifully, _ that should remain without further damage,” he rambled as Ed struggled to extract them both from the car whilst avoiding face-planting on the jagged gravel. Taking a moment once he’d found his footing to regard Oswald’s comment, he ultimately deemed it a charming attempt to regain some of his artful articulacy, but nonetheless an attempt wasted on their hypersensitive sense of humor — they hardly even noticed the detectives speed away through their teary eyes.

The trek up to and in through the front door proved to be indescribably (or at least that much with Ed’s temporarily limited vocabulary) difficult without their sorely missed muscular companions. Ed had suspected that if he and Oswald teamed together on this daunting journey, they’d have more luck getting to the house mostly unscathed. As it turned out, however, two individuals with no conception of coordination relying heavily on each other made the risk of injury exponentially higher, and by the time they finally stumbled in through the door and pushed it shut with their collected strength (or lack thereof), the knees of their pants were dirtied, the toes of their shoes scuffed and scratched, and at least Ed had suffered a minor scrape on the small stretch of exposed skin on his forearm.

“I’m never walking again,” he groaned exaggeratedly, collapsing onto the hearthrug in the living room next to Oswald, who had laid down a few seconds prior and was already curled into a tight ball.

“I agree. I think I should have made that decision a long time ago, anyway.”

“What, because of your leg?” Ed asked, shifting onto his side and scratching his fingers idly over the texture of the carpet.

“No, because it’s _ fucking _ exhausting in general,” Oswald said with a gut laugh, crossing his arms over his chest and tilting his head back to amplify the sound in the echoey room.

“I agree. Everything’s exhausting,” Ed mumbled, in truth too mesmerized by the way Oswald was smiling to offer more input than those few broken sentences.

“Mm,” Oswald hummed in agreement, letting his eyelids fall shut in thought. “Walking. Business. Fighting.”

_ “People,” _ Ed added with an eye roll, tucking his knees to his chest to mimic Oswald’s position. “People are the _ most _ exhausting.”

“Speaking of people, is Olga here? Do we know?” Oswald chimed in, derailing the conversation and trying to prop himself up to glance into the hallway.

“No, I don’t think so. Why?”

Oswald sighed and lowered himself back onto the floor, shuffling his legs up higher and eyeing Ed warily. “I’m just…I’m really cold.”

“Well, the heating in your house has never been superb,” Ed criticized, casting a scornful glance around the room as if he could glare into the house’s soul. “Do you want me to start a fire?”

“On the floor?” Oswald asked with quickly amounting fear, which Ed brushed off with a throaty cackle and a shake of his head.

“No, in the fireplace.”

“Oh,” Oswald said, contributing to Ed’s stream of laughter with a few breathless chuckles. “No, it’s too far. You’d have to walk. And I don’t want you to burn yourself trying. We could barely close a door by ourselves.”

A very true statement, Ed reflected, looking down the length of his horizontal body at the unfairly large front door with a distasteful frown. Such a thing shouldn’t have been so trying for the King and mayor of Gotham and his pupil, friend, and chief of staff. They were killers. Torturers. And yet here they were, lying on the floor complaining about walking and staring daggers at inanimate objects. At the moment, Ed wanted it no other way.

“Do you want my jacket?” he offered, returning to the conversation at hand.

“No,” Oswald whined after a thoughtful pause, wiggling around on the carpet fibres that existed in an eternal balance of mind-blowingly soft and just barely too scratchy to be comfortable. “I want _ you. _ Warm me, Ed.”

With a put-on grumble and sigh, Ed barrel-rolled closer to Oswald and spread him out on the floor like a throw rug, pinning him down by draping himself across his back, arms and legs framing his body protectively. With a frown and a thoughtful hum, Ed tucked his face into the crook of Oswald’s neck, rubbing his cheek against the skin there.

The air in the room was admittedly a little chilly, but underneath of all his layers plus a 160-pound man, Oswald’s temperature shouldn’t be too low, and judging from the heat against Ed’s cheek, it wasn’t.

“You don’t _ feel _ cold,” he observed, panting even hotter breath against Oswald’s neck. He tucked his hands under the smaller man’s body and traced them along his stomach, pressing his palm to a space just below his ribcage. “You’re actually really hot.”

“It’s…just how…close you are, I guess. Body heat and all that. And you’re kind of heavy,” Oswald huffed in reply, shifting minutely and inadvertently pressing Ed’s hand closer.

“You are wearing like, what, _ nine _ layers? Sit up, take some off,” Ed suggested, shoving himself to his knees and helping Oswald into a sitting position with his back to him, his damaged leg stretched out to the side.

Ed slipped his jacket off of him then wrapped his arms around his waist, hooking his chin over his shoulder to watch his hands as they fumbled with his vest.

“Can we add undressing you to that exhausting list?” he asked, finally unbuttoning the wretched thing and wrestling it off of Oswald, tossing it into some dark corner where he was unsure if they’d ever find it again, leaving the smaller man only in his button-up and whatever (if anything) he had underneath.

“Oh, of course,” Oswald concurred, catching Ed’s hands for a moment and turning to meet his eye. “Even _ I _ think it’s exhausting.”

“As you should,” Ed said with a laugh, smiling dopily at the other man. “You’re a chore to deal with. But how do you feel?” he asked, pulling his hands free and smoothing them over the clothed plane of Oswald’s shoulders. “Is that better?”

“It’s…” Oswald began, but trailed off, turning away then turning back, toying with the top button of his shirt, eyes flickering indecisively. “It’s still hot,” he said at last, mumbling it almost childishly, and Ed couldn’t stop himself from smiling even harder.

“Do you want me to take this off?” Ed asked, looping his hands back around the man and pinching the first button with uncoordinated fingers.

“Please,” Oswald breathed, pressing back against Ed’s chest. “If—If you don’t mind.”

“I don’t,” Ed admitted, and began fighting with the new line of obstacles under his fingers. In some strange, nearly inexplicable way, this one felt different, like he was working towards a different goal, involuntarily taking his time as each button undone revealed more of Oswald’s pale and lightly freckled chest (for he was wearing nothing else underneath, which surprised Ed and filled him with an emotion he could not identify).

With the last buttons undone, he tugged the shirttails from the waistband of Oswald’s pants and moved to pull it off, his hands brushing over Oswald’s fluttering chest and purely coincidentally grazing a nipple, which made the smaller man gasp and press against Ed more firmly, even as he struggled to finally rid him of the shirt.

There were no lights on in the mansion (for Ed always took care to turn them off and they hadn’t bothered to turn any back on before they laid down), but even in the low light Ed felt he could see every detail of Oswald’s skin: every nick and scrape, every waxy, raised scar, and every single freckle that dotted his shoulders. Those, Ed favored — those his heart skipped a beat at the sight of, and he lifted shaky hands to touch them.

He couldn’t feel a single one as he slid his palms over Oswald’s pale skin, which he supposed wasn’t surprising. They were hot to the touch, though, every inch of exposed flesh feverish and burning, those freckles of varying size and distinction like stars in an unfathomably distant sky, Ed’s own personal galaxy to explore and name, to touch and kiss if he so pleased.

Or maybe that was too presumptuous, for a kiss and a caress were two opposite poles of an “acceptable touches” spectrum — a caress was something he could get away with, something he could to a friend and blame on the haze in his skull. A kiss was something entirely different, and though perhaps it was something equally dismissable by his inebriated state, it was something he’d rather not risk.

Without permission, at least.

And permission he sought, leaning close to Oswald once more, his lips tickling the crest of his freckled ear. “Can I touch you?” he asked, low and breathy and huskier than he’d wanted it to be but something he felt he had no control over nevertheless.

“You already are,” Oswald replied, voice mirroring Ed’s in volume and clarity.

Ed smiled despite himself, pleased by how true Oswald’s words were. He _ was _touching him, in ways he’d never expected but dreamed of since they met. To have the King of Gotham like this, on the floor and not even looking at him, bare from the hips up and at his mercy, willing to let him touch his skin and see his freckles. It was delicious. But not what he’d meant.

He shuffled closer to Oswald, too-clothed chest meeting his back again as he encircled him in his arms, one looped around his waist and the other stretched vertically across his chest, palm hovering tentatively over his heart.

“I mean like this,” he clarified, voice hushed and not needing to be louder thanks to his proximity to Oswald’s ear.

“You already are,” the older man said again, heart hammering against Ed’s hand. “But yes. Please. Anything, anywhere.”

“Are you sure?”

“Are you?” Oswald countered, turning his head just slightly, just enough for Ed to catch a glimpse of his glittering eyes, half-lidded and dilated more than was necessary, even in the current darkness.

Ed growled and tugged Oswald closer, deliberately scraping his nails over a nipple and feeling the vibrations of Oswald’s neck from his gasp against his lips.

“I want you,” he hissed, pinning Oswald’s lower half against him with one hand below his navel. “I really, really want you.”

“You mean…?”

“In any way,” Ed answered, daring to roll his hips forward in a small circle and gasping in unison with Oswald’s whimper. “A-Anything you want. Ask. Or show. Or push me away if you want none of it. Maybe we won’t even remember.”

“I want to. Remember, that is,” Oswald said, rocking his hips back against Ed in response to the first tiny thrust he was offered. “And I want to do that. Anything. Whatever.”

“What do you want? Specifically?” Ed pressed, trying to fight the urge to meet Oswald’s grinding until he had a suitable answer.

“I-I…don’t know. Start with this?” he suggested, pushing his hips back more insistently. “And keep touching me. Please.”

It was a suitable request. A manageable one, even more so. One that permitted Ed what he’d been fighting, allowing him to buck forward against Oswald’s clothed ass and let out a shaky sigh, repeating the motion until they found a somewhat steady rhythm, or as steady of a rhythm as they could manage with their corrupted minds, which were turning even murkier with the beginnings of a lustful haze.

He pulled Oswald closer, one hand remaining where it lay just above his pelvis, and the other stroking lightly over his bare chest, trailing down to finally test the true sensitivity of Oswald’s nipples, rolling one between his forefinger and thumb before pinching it lightly.

It made Oswald’s breath catch, made him jerk back against Ed’s cock, and earned him the first real moan he’d heard since they began. It was a sound unparalleled, inimitable, and one that knocked the breath from Ed’s lungs and made the blood rush from his head.

“Again, again, _ please,” _ Oswald begged, grinding against Ed faster, harder, nonverbally encouraging Ed to do the same.

Tightening his grip on his hips, he increased their pace, brushing over the same nipple then twisting it suddenly. He received the same reaction: a jerk, a gasp, and a moan, but louder this time, less ashamed and more desperate, and Ed almost passed out at the sound of it.

“On your back,” he ordered, turning Oswald around and pushing him down onto the carpet, hooking his legs up over his back and leaning down to press his lips to Oswald’s breastbone.

In this position, he could see and feel the prominent bulge in Oswald’s pants, and he pressed against it as he dragged his lips toward the nipple he’d left untouched, flicking his tongue over it and bucking his hips forward.

“Oh _ fuck,” _ Oswald groaned, gripping the back of Ed’s neck and holding him in place. “Please, Ed…”

“Do you…I mean…” Ed pulled away, staring down at Oswald, his eyes dark and glinting in the low light. “Do you…want me to move on?”

_ “Yes,” _ Oswald whined, squeezing his eyes shut and rolling his hips.

“O-Oh, um…uh, to what?”

_ “Anything.” _

“Do you…want me to make you come?” Ed asked and mentally slapped himself for it immediately after.

_ “Yes, _ oh God, Ed, _ please. _ I need to come. Make me come.”

“Fuck,” Ed swore, pulling away and ripping his vest off, tossing it in the same direction that Oswald’s clothes had disappeared in. “Okay. _ Fuck. _ Why is this so difficult?”

“It’s not difficult,” Oswald soothed, sitting up and cupping Ed’s face, “but we don’t have to do anything. I mean…that is if you don’t—”

“I already said I do,” Ed interrupted, placing his hands over Oswald’s. “I just don’t know where to start.”

“Well, for what it’s worth, I think you had a really good start,” Oswald said with a smile and a giggle. “If you hadn’t, I probably wouldn’t be this hard.”

Ed smiled in spite of his blush and the pang of arousal low in his stomach, laughing and ducking his head in embarrassment but keeping it lowered when his eyes found the tent in Oswald’s pants once more.

“That uh—it…probably…something to do with the drug,” he stammered, swallowing the lump in his throat.

“Wouldn’t you expect it to have the opposite effect?”

“I really don’t know what to expect from that stuff,” Ed said with a laugh and a shrug, dragging his eyes back up to meet Oswald’s. “I don’t know what it was. Maybe we’ll die in five minutes, maybe we’ll have mind-blowing sex — we can’t really know for sure.”

Oswald shuddered at the suggestion, eyes falling closed pensively. “I much prefer the latter.”

“As do I,” Ed agreed, running his hands down Oswald’s bare sides and hooking them in the waistband of his pants. “And I think taking these off would be a suitable start. Can I?”

“Please do,” Oswald pleaded softly, guiding Ed’s fingers to his belt buckle and meeting his eyes hungrily. “Can I take…any of your clothes off?”

Ed froze, his fingers poised to loosen the buckle, his mind screeching to a tire-burning halt. He’d almost completely forgotten that sex required _ mutual _ nudity.

“E-Ed?”

He swallowed. “My shirt. And my pants. But…can we leave the undershirt on?”

Oswald blinked, staring at him as if he’d asked if they’d be allowed to eat that day. “Of course, Ed. You don’t have to take anything off if you don’t want to, I was just—”

“Shirt and pants,” Ed interjected, catching Oswald’s chin and locking their eyes together. “Go.”

With that word, they set off again, Ed practically tearing Oswald’s belt apart and Oswald unfastening the buttons on Ed’s shirt as fast as his unsteady fingers would let him. The smaller of the two was destined to be the first one nude — that fact wasn’t surprising — but it still made him blush when Ed finished with his zipper and slid his pants to his knees, his cock visibly straining against his black briefs.

Ed smiled and tugged his shirt off his arms, bundling it up and tossing it onto the couch. “We still have our shoes on. Go ahead and finish getting undressed and I’ll do the same — it’ll be faster this way.”

Oswald scoffed and frowned, sitting down and shuffling back to yank his pants off. “It’ll be less intimate, though.”

“Well, we could take our time,” Ed suggested, raising a dubious eyebrow as he started on his belt. “Make the foreplay _ slow. _ Make you _ wait.” _

Oswald glared at him, eyes nearly black with unexpressed desire. “You made your point. Take your pants off.”

“I’m _ working _ on it,” Ed snapped back, pushing himself to his feet to expedite the process, stumbling back and forth as he fought with both shoes and his pants. “Clothes are a pain in my ass.”

“When did you take up free swearing?” Oswald grumbled in concentration, tugging the laces on his shoes and kicking them off towards the unlit fireplace.

“Drugs,” Ed replied vaguely, hopping precariously on one foot as he tugged at the shoe on the other. “Mind-fucking drugs. Loosen my tongue.”

“Mind-fucking drugs make Ed talk like caveman,” Oswald grunted, mimicking the stereotype of those neolithic troglodytes and busting out laughing at himself. He was much farther along in the undressing process, Ed noted with a frown, but he calmed his competitive nature by reminding himself that Oswald had gotten a free headstart, courtesy of Ed’s insatiable desire. How lucky.

“You still have socks on,” Ed pointed out, finally removing both of his shoes and chucking them at the nearest wall, satisfied when they hit it with a sharp thud and tumbled to the floor. “And I’m catching up,” he added, throwing his belt at Oswald and tugging his pants down.

“Is it a race?” Oswald asked, perking up at the prospect. “You didn’t tell me. But considering all I have on are these and these,” he said, waving one foot in the air and snapping the waistband of his briefs, “I think I’ve already won.”

“Being cocky will get you nowhere,” Ed scolded, narrowing his eyes and wrestling his pants off his legs.

“But showing you my cock will?” Oswald asked, quirking an eyebrow. Ed hated himself for the way that made his mouth go dry.

“I-I…wh…”

Oswald groaned, the back of his head thunking against the floor. “Are you _ done _ yet? You said this would make it _ faster.” _

“It _ will,” _ Ed barked back, regaining some modicum of articulacy and starting on his socks. “Suits require a lot of layers which prove to be a giant pain in the ass when you’re trying to have sex.”

Oswald sighed almost wistfully, humming in agreement. “Tell me about it.”

“I just did.”

“Tell me again,” Oswald said, voice strained, and when Ed absentmindedly looked up, he choked on the sight of Oswald palming himself through his boxers. “I like hearing your voice.”

At that, Ed actually fell. Crashed to his knees like a man who’d walked five hundred miles and stared, mouth agape, heart hammering in his throat, and cock throbbing in its confines. The only criticism he had was that he wished he’d lit that fire — the warm backlighting would make the view positively ethereal, Oswald whimpering and arching off the floor as he gripped the hard outline of his erection.

“Please, Ed. You had your fun, we played the game, now _ please…” _

Ed had never moved so fast, the carpet threatening to burn his knees as he scrambled over, smacking Oswald’s hand away and situating himself between his legs, forearms pressed to the floor and face mere inches from Oswald’s.

“Hi,” the man beneath him panted, digging his nails into his shoulders. “That was fast.”

“You didn’t see yourself,” Ed muttered, admiring Oswald’s flushed face.

“And what a blessing that is.”

The sincerity of those words felt like a punch to the gut, heart cramping with despair.

“Don’t say that,” Ed pleaded, brushing Oswald’s hair back from his face and trailing his palm down his neck and chest, slowly approaching the mouth-watering object of his desires. “You’re gorgeous. Truly. I’ve never met anyone like you.”

Oswald gasped, eyes glassy, and Ed was unsure whether it was in response to his comments or the fact that he’d tugged Oswald’s briefs down to his thighs, wrapping his hand around his bare cock.

“You’re perfect, Oswald. Beautiful. Smart — so, _ so _smart. So strong. So determined. Your skin is a storybook of the struggles you’ve overcome, and I can’t stop reading it. This chapter,” he breathed, ghosting his lips over the tender scar on his shoulder, “is my favorite. I was a main character in that one.”

“Ed,” Oswald whimpered, eyes twisted shut and head cast to the side. Ed tightened his grip, increasing the speed of his strokes only slightly, twisting his wrist and circling his thumb over the rosy head.

“You’re a puzzle I don’t want to solve, Oswald,” Ed continued, dipping his head and pressing hot kisses to the column of Oswald’s quivering throat. “A riddle I don’t know the answer to. And I want to keep it that way. You’re the only mystery I want in my life. Please stay. Please be in my life,” he begged hoarsely, trailing his lips higher and latching onto a place just below Oswald’s jawline.

“Fuck, _ Ed…” _

“Do you like this?” he asked once he’d pulled away, a bright red mark left in his wake. “Being praised like this? Being touched like this?”

“Yes, _ fuck. _ Only by you, Ed, only you…”

“How good of a job am I doing?” he asked, not entirely seeking praise for his actions but instead needing to know if Oswald was still okay with the current proceedings, if there was anything he needed, anything he _ wanted. _

“So good, you’re perfect, Ed, you’re perfect,” he whimpered between gasps. “Just keep talking. A-And let me touch you. I want to touch you, Ed.”

It was a desire gleefully met, Ed pulling back to finally remove his briefs, sighing at the release. He slid Oswald’s the rest of the way off his legs then tossed them both over his shoulder, crawling back up Oswald’s body and pecking his chin, his jaw, his cheek, trying to regain his attention.

“It would be better if we laid on our sides, I think,” he said, speaking lowly into his ear.

“Mm, not practical. Hard to coordinate. Touch us both,” Oswald panted, opening his eyes and staring up at Ed pleadingly.

“What do you mean?”

“Like this,” he instructed, pressing a hot palm over Ed’s tailbone so he’d lower his hips and taking his hand, guiding it lower and manually closing it around both of their cocks. The reaction was immediate, both of them gasping and Oswald’s back arching. He reached up shakily, cupping the back of Ed’s neck and pulling him down for a kiss as Ed began to move his hand slowly, shuddering and moaning against Oswald’s lips at the sensation, gripping them both tighter and slowly working up to a steady, fast pace.

The kissing grew harder to maintain as he sped up, mindlessly rocking his hips to chase the friction that never left, sloppily pushing his tongue into the warmth of Oswald’s mouth, whimpering and losing the rhythm of his hand.

Oswald reached down to help him, covering what exposed flesh there was with his hand and guiding Ed back into a better rhythm, a faster one that cut their kiss abruptly short, their chests heaving in a struggle to catch their breath.

“Close,” Oswald whimpered, bringing Ed closer so he could bury in his shoulder, hiding his face from view.

“I wanna see you,” Ed said, fisting his hand in Oswald’s hair. “Please let me see you.”

“Embarrassing,” Oswald whined, removing his hand to let Ed completely control the pace, reaching up and clawing at the undershirt still covering his back.

“Please,” Ed tried again, gently pulling at Oswald’s hair. “I want something to think about when I don’t have you.”

That earned him a choked sound that seemed almost like a sob, but Oswald conceded, lowering himself back to the floor and panting, his eyes pinched shut.

“F-Faster,” he begged, hips rocking to meet each frenzied downward stroke. “I’m so close. T-Talk—talk to me.”

With the way his chest was heaving, Ed doubted he’d be able to form coherent sentences, but he’d try nonetheless, stroking them both as fast as he dared to.

“P…Please, Oswald. Come for me. I w-wanna hear you, wanna see you, wanna…wanna remember it forever. I need you to, I can’t do it without you. _ F-Fuck_—Please, please, Oswald. I’ve thought about it so much, touched myself to the thought of it, let me see if I was—”

He was cut off by a hoarse cry, Oswald’s hips bucking as he came, coating Ed’s hand and his own bare stomach, his face twisted in ecstasy. It was a gorgeous sight, an indescribable feeling, and he was winded by his own resulting orgasm, arm shaking as he fought to hold himself up, still working his hand over the both of them until he was flinching from oversensitivity.

With a final gasping cry he dropped next to Oswald, palms flat against the floor and face upturned towards the ceiling as he fought for his breath, thighs still trembling.

There was silence for a long time, long past the point that Ed’s heaving breaths had quietened to soft panting, long past the waning of his post-orgasmic euphoria — so long that his chest was cramping with fear, his mind whirring to figure out what he could have done wrong.

Then Oswald spoke.

“I love you, Ed.”

And his mind stopped working.

Waking up to natural light was always something that Ed had detested, though he’d never truly been able to figure out why. It felt wrong, to rely on something as unpredictable as a ray of sunshine to wake you up when you needed to be. And when Ed opened his eyes, he knew he hadn’t woken up when he needed to be.

Through the tall window on the far wall, he guessed it was close to nine in the morning, the beams of golden sunshine bathing his chest in warmth. There was an unpleasant lightness to his head as he forced himself up, spine cracking in protest.

With a cursory glance at his surroundings, he knew where he was. And where he wasn’t supposed to be. The carpet beneath his bare — _ bare _ — skin was coarse and more than a little uncomfortable, the sooty fireplace to his right still unlit, the lights in the room still off. The only noticeable differences were the blanket draped over him and the neat pile of clean clothes in the place of his bedfellow — for he was sure there should be one, from the sticky, spent state he found himself.

The outfit laid out was a simple t-shirt and a pair of oversized khakis likely left over from Ed’s old wardrobe. He slipped them and the proffered pair of underwear on with ease, paying little mind to the way the pant legs bunched up around his ankles as he stumbled out into the hallway.

The house was unsettlingly silent, almost haunting, and Ed began to suspect that he was horribly alone when there was a small sound from the kitchen. It was a cough, or so it sounded — maybe a choked sigh, maybe a whispered swear word, but a sound nonetheless, and one Ed followed as quickly as he could without losing his pants.

Oswald was dressed similarly to Ed, his hair still tousled and tacky from the product that hadn’t been properly removed in two nights. He looked up at Ed as he entered, a cup of steaming tea untouched on the table before him, his eyes almost humorously wide at the sight of the only other person living in the house.

“Ed,” he whispered almost reverentially, angling his body toward him. “Good morning.”

“G’morning,” Ed said, testing his voice and taken aback by how it deep and gruff it was. He cleared his throat and rolled the heel of his hand against his brow, head swimming from the artificial lighting of the kitchen.

“I laid out some medicine,” Oswald said, gesturing to the seat across from him where two pills and another cup of tea sat. “Ibuprofen. For the headache and the stiffness.”

“Thank you,” Ed sighed, trudging toward the seat and taking the pills with the tea, less concerned by his burning tastebuds and more intrigued by the scalding beverage, whose taste was too familiar to not be deliberate. “Is this—?”

“Yes,” Oswald answered, not waiting to hear the rest of the question. “I thought it might help.”

The flavor of ginger was truthfully somewhat unpleasant, too strong and aromatic for Ed’s hungover state, but he drank it nevertheless, comforted by the familiarity of it all. The only difference was the circumstances, but after giving it some brief consideration, Ed decided he preferred these circumstances over the former.

“So…” he began, but never finished, leaving worlds unsaid and hardly even conceived in his still hazy mind. However, Oswald still flinched at the simple word.

“I’m sure we can dismiss it. We were heavily drugged, laying on each other, even. Jervis is a master of mental manipulation, perhaps it was a deliberate attack on our relationship and reputations—”

“Do you want to forget it?” Ed asked, easing himself into the chair, keeping his eyes locked on Oswald’s face as it gradually grew more shocked.

“Well—I—I only assumed—”

“Don’t evade the question,” Ed pressed, setting his teacup down and dusting off his hands. “I’m asking _ you. _ Do _ you _ want to forget it?”

“No,” Oswald said simply, face falling and setting into determined impassivity. “No, I don’t.”

“Then why dismiss it?” Ed queried, leaning forward with narrowed eyes. “There’s no need to sweep it under the rug if we don’t regret it.”

“You…You don’t…?”

“I’m not sure what exactly you remember, but _ I _ came onto _ you,” _ Ed said, a fond smile quirking the corners of his lips at the memory. “The only thing I regret was doing it in such an intoxicated state. Your first time shouldn’t have occurred under drug-induced circumstances.”

Oswald’s face reddened at the mention of his recent virginity, his fingers drumming idly on the edge of the table. “I’d only regret that if I forgot it. But I didn’t. And it certainly boosted our confidence.”

“That, it did,” Ed agreed with a smug grin. “So, after a fruitful experiment, I have some thoughts on the drug we were administered.”

“Oh?” Oswald prompted, eyes glittering with interest.

“Yes. Through extensive firsthand research, it is obviously a narcotic that dulls the conscience, loosens the tongue, but heightens the senses. Lasts for approximately four hours, though that theory was never correctly tested. Boosts one’s confidence, and apparently heightens arousal and expedites sexual encounters. My conclusion being: I want more.”

That earned him an honest laugh — a throat-shaking, face to the ceiling laugh that echoed through the empty house. It brought a smile to Ed’s face.

“I don’t regret last night, Oswald. In no way, shape, or form. I’m only mildly disappointed in myself for my disloyalty to Isabella. But I’m changing that — I’m leaving her today. We never got very far, anyway.”

“What if she resists?” Oswald asked, tilting his head to the side.

“Then I’ll show her the state of the rug,” Ed replied with a grin, gesturing over his shoulder to the living room. Oswald’s face burned scarlet at the suggestion, but he didn’t verbally deny Ed permission to go through with such a thing. “It’s unlikely that any genuine attachment was made — this will be our third day knowing each other. It was a hasty relationship.”

“And that wasn’t?” Oswald said, pointing to the living room.

“That was different. We have history. Chemistry. Now-resolved sexual tension. There was so much beneath the surface that it merely broke through last night, like a volcano erupting. It wasn’t our fault, but I’m damn glad it happened. I just have one question, though,” he said, shifting farther back in his seat and avoiding eye contact for the first time in this whole encounter. It was a sore subject he was broaching, one he himself only vaguely remembered, but he needed clarity. Some conceited part of him declared that he _ deserved _ clarity.

With his fingers clenched nervously in the slack of his pants, he dared to meet Oswald’s eyes again. “Did you mean what you said last night?”

“I’m sure I said a lot of things, Ed,” Oswald mumbled, averting his eyes and taking the first sip of his tea.

“And I’m sure you know what I’m talking about. After I made you come—” at that, Oswald choked—“right before we fell asleep. You said something to me. I need to know if it was true.”

“I…can’t remember,” Oswald said, the tips of his ears darkening to a charming pink. “You may have to remind me. What did I say?”

Ed smiled. Even hungover and with his face burning from embarrassment, Oswald was still being coy. Teasing. Ed wanted him no other way.

He leaned forward slowly, the table creaking under his evenly distributed weight, and when Oswald caught his eye, he spoke.

“I love you.”

The only sound for an extended moment thereafter was Oswald’s immediate gasp, eyes trained on a spot on the table, something distant and unseen. Ed waited patiently, for he was sure no great amount of time had passed before Oswald spoke again.

“Is it true?” he asked, flicking his eyes up to look at Ed once more. “Do _ you _ mean it?”

Ed swallowed nervously, running his blunt nails along the polished surface of the table, giving Oswald the same brief silent treatment he received. The silence was rather comforting when he was on the giving end, taking the time to mull over his answer before saying it aloud. In truth, the extra meditation was unnecessary, but such a thing took care, certainty. One couldn’t rush it.

“I think it has been for a very long time,” he said at last, some great unknowable weight being lifted from his chest once the words were out. Once more, there was silence, but Ed suspected it wasn’t unpleasant for either party, judging from the growing smile on Oswald’s face.

“Well then, my dear Mr. Nygma,” he announced, pushing himself to his feet, “it appears we have a magician to thank, favors to repay, and drugs to steal.”

A mischievous grin split Ed’s face, and in every part of his mind and body alike, he knew there was no greater feeling than wanting something and knowing you could have it.

**Author's Note:**

> The longest shit I write is porn what the fuck  
I had a lot of fun writing this although it took me about a solid week! I'd love to know what you thought of it!! If you've read any of my past fanfictions, you know that I _love_ all comments — good comments, criticizing comments, long comments, short comments, they make my day!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading!!


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